In the semiconductor integrated circuit (IC) industry, photolithography is the process to use light to transfer circuit patterns to a semiconductor wafer, such as, a silicon or GaAs wafer. However, the photolithography process becomes more challenging when the desired pattern size on wafer becomes smaller and smaller and the features of the pattern become closer and closer to each other.
Besides, duo to the limitations of light, these transferred patterns appear with errors or irregularities such as line widths that are narrower or wider than designed. If these distortions are not corrected, the electrical properties of what was being fabricated may be altered significantly. Therefore, it is desirable to find a method for IC design to compensate for image errors.